CT Progressive

From the uncanny metaphor department, a fine quote from an article about a newly-elected Green Party Constable in New Canaan:

Stangler said he was asked by the Green Party to run for constable in June, the same month he graduated from high school.

Now that he’s studying at Georgetown, the 300-mile commute between New Canaan and Washington, D.C. could make it difficult to fulfill his duties. Fortunately, constables are able to decide for themselves just how much or how little they are able to accomplish as an elected official.

“We have had constables who, I believe, have never served papers,” Claudia Weber, Town Clerk, said. “We had a constable who lived in Germany. Out of all the offices, constable is the one where, if you choose to, you don’t have to invest a lot of time into the position.”

Weber added that, in a town with an active police force, like New Canaan, the responsibilities of a constable may be fulfilled by the police force.

“[Constable] is one of these positions that the state of Connecticut holds onto even though it really has no useful purpose,” Mike DeRosa, co-chair of the Connecticut Green Party, said. “It’s sort of like pet rocks: there’s a subjective meaning to something that has no specific meaning.”

No useful purpose, subjective meaning to something that has no specific meaning? Sounds just like the Greens to me.

As a bonus, a description of the campaign:

While Stangler admits that he didn’t campaign very seriously, he and a friend walked around Waveny Park during the annual Family Fourth celebration and tried to shake hands with as many people as possible.

“Many people didn’t want to talk to me. They thought I was delusional,” he said, who also added that he was wearing a straw cowboy hat donning an American flag. “I’d say I shook about 15 to 20 people’s hands. That was basically my only true campaigning, (besides) word of mouth and telling my friends and what not.”

Stangler’s July 4th campaigning efforts were followed by the Green Party’s Independence Day celebration on the steps of the Ferguson Library in Stamford where he joined members in playing music like Bruce Springsteen and the Grateful Dead while 2008 Green Party candidate for Congress Richard Duffee (who Stangler also campaigned for in 2008) read the Declaration of Independence out loud.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 28th, 2009 at 3:18 pm and is filed under Party Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.